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Kabu-Tsukuri [かぶ作り] is a simple gambling game for 2-5 players.
Kabu-Tsukuri is played with a standard 48-card hanafuda deck. Each month in the hanafuda deck corresponds to one of the numbers from 1 to 12. So all January cards are 1, February cards are 2, and so on, up to December which is 12.
You must be familiar with the Hanafuda month sequence before playing the game.
It may not be attested, but it seems likely that it was originally played using a Mekurifuda deck or a 48-card Kabu-type Karuta deck, such as Irinokichi or Kinseizan.
Alternatively, one can take an international 52-card deck and remove all Kings. Ignoring suits (and counting the Aces as 1), the result is exactly equivalent to a kabufuda deck.
Additionally, it is recommended to use chips or other small counters to keep track of bets and players’ scores.
For the initial hand, determine the dealer using a method of your choice.
For subsequent hands, there seems to be no attested method of choosing the next dealer, since there are at least 3 winners per round. This must be agreed upon by a house rule.
Before the game starts, determine the bet size, which is a fixed amount of chips that each player will place during each betting round.
For 2 to 4 players, the dealer deals 10 cards to each player.
For 5 players, the dealer deals 9 cards to each player.
The remaining cards will not be used during the entire hand.
Each player then arranges their cards into three rows of three face-down cards onto the table near them.
Each player places a bet equal to the agreed bet size, and then exposes the first row of cards.
The strength of the row is determined, and the player with the strongest card row takes the pot.
The method of determining the strength has not been attested. See Editor’s Note. (NEEDS MORE DOCUMENTATION)
In the case of a draw, the pot for the first row carries over to the second row.
Similarly, each player places a bet equal to the agreed bet size, and then exposes the second row of cards.
The strength of the row is determined, and the player with the strongest card row takes the pot.
The method of determining the strength has not been attested. See Editor’s Note. (NEEDS MORE DOCUMENTATION)
In the case of a draw, the pot for the second row carries over to the third row.
Similarly, each player places a bet equal to the agreed bet size, and then exposes the final row of cards.
The strength of the row is determined, and the player with the strongest card row takes the pot.
The method of determining the strength has not been attested. See Editor’s Note. (NEEDS MORE DOCUMENTATION)
In the case of a draw, the pot for the third row carries over to the first row of the next hand.
Unfortunately, the method of determining the strength has not been attested; I have personally tried using the Oicho-Kabu method of using the ones digit of the sum of the month numbers of the cards, but forming a row equal to 9 is extremely easy and more often than not would end up in a tie. So it must use a list of Hand Rankings of some sort, probably the same list as the extended Hand Rankings list used in Oicho-Kabu as a local rule.